Mica: opening statement to Commission on Ukraine Famine (05/04/86)

Mica: opening statement to Commission on Ukraine Famine

Below is the text of the opening statement delivered by Rep. Daniel A. Mica, chairman of the U.S. Commission on the Ukraine Famine.

The Commission on the Ukraine Famine, which I am proud to chair, has been given an important mandate: to report to Congress on the tragic man-made famine of 1932-33 in Ukraine. It has been estimated by scholars that 7 million Ukrainians and an untold number of others lost their lives as result of a policy of crop seizures carried out by the Soviet government then led by Joseph Stalin. Our mandate is to determine, in so far as possible and on the basis of all available evidence, the causes and effects of the man-made famine, the role of the Soviet authorities in bringing it about, and the response to it by the free countries of the world. Our task today is to establish the basis for our carrying out this mandate.

Before we turn to the specific tasks of today's meeting, a few words must be said concerning the importance of our work. Many may ask - why should the government of this nation consider what took place over a half a century ago far from our shores?

There are several answers to this legitimate question. The most obvious is that there are among us today naturalized Americans who witnessed the events that we are mandated to study. These individuals who fled their native land to escape Soviet persecution were deeply traumatized and still bear the scars of what they survived five decades ago. The Holocaust of World War II also took place outside the United States, but our government commemorates that heinous crime against humanity not only out of reverence for the memory of its victims and respect for its survivors who have come here and made their tremendous contribution to this nation, but also because of what we can learn from it and apply to the problems of our own era.

The study of the Ukrainian famine is not a matter of parochial interest to one people and one part of the world. If it were so, there would be little justification for the establishment of this commission by the government of the United States. However, it is precisely in understanding the specific events of the Ukrainian famine that we may hope to gain valuable insights into issues of continued public policy concern.

In 1932-33, the Soviet government used food as a weapon against the Ukrainian people. In our own day, food is used as a weapon against those struggling to free themselves from Soviet client regimes in Ethiopia and Afghanistan.

The murder of 7 million Ukrainians by the Soviet government was an act of genocide which prepared the way for the paradigmatic act of genocide in all human history - Hitler's destruction of the European Jews. And genocide is not merely a historical phenomenon carried out by fascist regimes which have been destroyed. It has occurred in Cambodia and may occur again. Totalitarian governments, armed with ideologies which hold any crime permissible in the pursuit of their political goals are by their nature capable of genocide.

The Ukrainian famine, despite the brief flurry of publicity in the West, soon degenerated into an exercise in the techniques of disinformation. The role played by certain representatives of the Western press was particularly disgraceful in that they allowed themselves to be used as tools to obscure the truth. Disinformation is still with us, and the study of this crime, which long disappeared from public consciousness so completely that it represents the most successful denial of genocide by its perpetrators, can tell us much about current disinformation efforts.

Lastly, the Ukrainian famine was a crucial event in the history of America's major adversary - the Soviet Union. It is bound up with the culmination of a campaign to stamp out non-Russian national self-assertion as a hindrance to the establishment of a Russian centralist regime. That regime is still with us in much the same form as Stalin left it. Only by understanding how Stalin gave the Soviet state its present form can we hope to fully comprehend what Stalin created.

We therefore bear a large responsibility in work as members of the Ukraine Famine Commission. We must establish the facts about what has long been concealed. We must work to restore to public consciousness that which has disappeared from it for far too long. And we must remember above all that our ultimate responsibility is not to any one community, not even to the victims of this heinous crime, but to the American public and the elusive ideal of truth.

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